A Mental Health Community

Introduction: The Problem

Los Angeles, CA, estimated 48,000 people homeless, 50 block area called Skid Row has more homeless people than the whole homeless population of San Francisco.

32.7% of people on the streets suffer from a mental illness, compared to the 15.7% of non-homeless living with mental illness (Audrey).

Mental illness: a person’s emotions, thoughts, or behavior are so abnormal that it causes severe suffering.

Psychosis: severe disconnect from reality and can suffer delusions and hallucinations

11% of homeless patients suffer from Schizophrenia(Audrey).

Seemingly endless cycle of going from the streets, to jail, to hospitalizations, and back on the streets.

The Causes

Many believe homelessness is something completely unrelated to them but in fact 14 million Americans have a period of homelessness throughout their life time (Coldwell).

One of the biggest reasons for the influx of homelessness was mental asylums shutting down. When the asylum era was truly blooming in the beginning of the 20th century there was a balance of care for long-term residents but social stigma and government caused these homes to become dilapidated (Smith).

Many asylums ended up having to close which gave its residents nowhere to go. There has been an effort to open community based care centers but a lot have failed because of funding and other reasons.

The Consequences

30%-60% of individuals with a serious illness are not taking the medications they need to

Cycle of incarceration, homelessness, and emergency hospitalizationsresult in a higher rate of health care costs for these people, which trap them even more (Smith).

15.3% of jail inmates have been homeless in the past year, 7.5-11.3 times higher than the general U.S. population. Among those homeless inmates mental illness, was 10%-22% more prevalent than non-homeless inmates (Greg).

The Community

The mental health community program has a simple mission statement to get mentally ill people off the streets and give them the opportunity to have a new life.

The program will target those who have psychosis problems

The program will offer these people many things including a place to sleep, therapy, psychiatry for medications, job counseling, and other amenities.

If the program is successful I plan to expand it to other cities.

The Community: Patients

The patients will be delegated responsibilities and as they improve in recovery they will get more responsibilities.

Responsibilities start with making your bed in the morning to cooking dinner to group therapy leaders.

The patients will be sharing a room with another person that they will need to interact with and socialize.

The Community: Staff

Licensed clinical psychologists to run individual and group therapy sessions with the patients.

There will be a therapist in the community 24 hours a day in case of emergencies.

1 or 2 psychiatrists who will be able to prescribe the patients the medication they need to take.

Nurses to perform health check-ups on the patients because their physical health is just as important as their mental health.

The Community: Services

Individual Therapy: this will be a one-on-one session with the patient and therapist. They will tackle root issues of the disorder and work towards a better state of mind.

Group Therapy: placing patients with similar disorders together will help them feel connected to someone and socialize.

Psychiatric Help: patients will meet with a psychiatrist to develop a medication regiment in order to help recover

Other: health check-ups, job counseling, and family therapy sessions

Goals and ObjectivesThe homeless rates in

cities like Los Angeles is appalling, especially when it comes to people that cannot escape without help, and that is where this program steps in.

With this community we hope to save these people from chronic homelessness. To free them of a menacing fate of jails, hospitals, and homelessness.

Goals and Objectives

Healthy lifestyle through mental and physical check-ups.

Safety and a place to sleep so family members will no longer have to worry.

Once completed their treatment they will be able to enter the workforce and start a new life.

Timeline: The First YearMonth 1:

Find a facility Assemble a dream

teamMonth 2:

Creating the facility Recruitment

Month 3: Finding patients

Month 4-7: Introducing the

Community Group Staff Meetings

Month 8: Business as Usual Group Staff Meeting Quarterly Meeting

Month 9-11: Business as Usual Group Staff Meetings

Month 12: Business as Usual Group Staff Meeting Quarterly Meeting

The community will continue to run in the fashion indefinitely.

Conclusion The devastating truth

behind many of the homeless we roll our eyes at and ignore is something we need to face and deal with strongly.

Community care can increase patient’s quality of life, decrease days spent homeless, and decrease government costs (Gilmer).

Give families their children, siblings, parents back. A mental health community can restore these people’s hopes and dreams.